The Best TV of 2004
I don’t watch a lot of TV, so a show has to be good to get my attention. Here’s what got me to sit in front of the tube this year:
Arrested Development
There is invariably one scene in every episode that makes me laugh so hard I either a) pull a muscle in my stomach b) fall off the couch c) snort and hope the neighbors didn’t hear. For those of you who “don’t get" this show, I'm sorry. You probably never will.
Lost
Cool on a lot of levels, but mostly that it’s a show about a desert island that doesn’t involve Jeff Probst. Every episode is something different, and it keeps me coming back each week for more.
Scrubs
I didn’t start watching this until I saw Garden State, and I wish they’d hurry up and get Season 1 out on DVD so that I can see what I’ve missed. Thankfully, I made it in time for Heather Graham’s guest run, but the entire cast has a great chemistry, and the random humor is right up my alley. Long live the squirrel army!
Entourage
I figured HBO would be a waste of money once The Sopranos ended this year, but after two episodes of this show, I was hooked. Insider Hollywood jokes, fantastic cameos, and Jeremy Piven chewing scenery as a sleazeball agent combine to make this worth ponying up for the premium channels.
R.I.P.: Angel
The writing got better, the plotlines got more interesting, and the ratings went up, so the WB cancelled the show. I’ll never understand L.A.
Oh yeah. Reality TV still sucks, and it's only getting worse.
12.30.2004
12.29.2004
Best of 2004 Awards (Music)
I'm waiting on a couple of movies that I'm going to try to see this weekend before I make any final judgments on those, so the movie list will probably appear after the first of the year. However, I've listened to all the music I can handle for one year, so here are my musical "Bests" for 2004.
The Best Albums released in 2004 (in no order):
U2, How To Dismantle An Atomic Bomb
Somebody slips a copy of War to The Edge and reminds him that he’s a great guitarist. Bono combines lyrics about God, his father’s death, and the state of the world into some great songs. There’s too many mid-tempo soundalikes for this to be a truly classic album, but it’s not a stretch to say that this is their best work since Achtung Baby.
Secret Machines, Now Here Is Nowhere
Pink Floyd with John Bonham on drums, by way of Texas. I don’t know why it works, but it does. This was the disc that came the closest to blowing out my speakers this year.
Michael Giacchino, The Incredibles soundtrack
Come on, people! Everything about this movie kicks ass, plain and simple. Think 60’s James Bond scores, and you’re pretty close on this one. Lots of brass and xylophone, and some of the best recurring themes since Star Wars.
The Killers, Hot Fuss
OK, so they dress like Duran Duran. And kind of look like them. And maybe sound like them, just a little bit. The songs are still damn catchy.
Keane, Hopes and Fears
Coldplay - guitars + a slightly more uplifting worldview = gorgeous.
Jem, Finally Woken
Ah, Jem. So beautiful AND so talented. When will you make up that cancelled Indianapolis show so that we can fall in love and run off to Wales together? Until then, I'll just keep listening to your truly excellent album of hip-hop-influenced Brit pop.
Franz Ferdinand, (self-titled)
They’re Scottish. They dress well. We get it. How about the fact that they mixed new wave and disco and made a kick-ass album of fresh-sounding dance-rock?
DJ Danger Mouse, The Grey Album
Danger Mouse lays Jay-Z’s Black Album rhymes over samples from The Beatles’ White Album and pushes music forward 10 years in one step. Too bad it will never get a legal release. Silly short-sighted music industry.
Chris Thile, Deceiver
Nickel Creek’s wünderkind mandolinist goes solo and shows off on a few more instruments... 25 more to be exact. Rock, pop, jazz, bluegrass; Thile does it all (often in the same song) and does it well.
Green Day, American Idiot
Aren’t concept albums what punks were rebelling against in the first place? You’d think this would be a disaster, but instead it’s Green Day’s most mature and powerful disc yet.
The Best Albums I Discovered in 2004
Jay-Z, The Black Album
The Postal Service, Give Up
Spoon, Girls Can Tell
Teitur, Poetry & Aeroplanes
Abandoned Pools, Humanistic
Snow Patrol, Final Straw
Elefant, Sunlight Makes Me Paranoid
Coheed & Cambria, In Keeping Secrets of Silent Earth 3
Sean Watkins, 26 Miles
Paste Magazine's sampler discs (included with each issue)
Song of the Year: "Take Me Out", Franz Ferdinand. Overplayed? Yes. Overhyped? Absolutely. But take a break for a month or two, then go back and listen again. That tempo shift at the 0:56 mark will get your booty shakin' every time.
Runner-up: “American Idiot”, Green Day.
Ubiquitous Singer: Ben Gibbard. Between the O.C., Garden State previews, and an near-perfect guest turn on Styrofoam's "Couches in Alleys", the voice of Death Cab for Cutie and The Postal Service was the world’s most-heard alt-rocker of 2004. Seth Cohen must be so pleased.
Hot Singer: Jem Griffiths. Not only did she put out one of the best albums of the year (see above), her Willow Rosenberg-meets-hip-hop-star looks had me cutting out magazine pictures and hanging them on my wall like I was 12 years old again. The best-looking thing to come out of Wales since, uh... Tom Jones? Ryan Giggs? Ioan Gryffud?
Best technological innovation: iTunes Music store. OK, so it's been around since last year, but it really became a force this year, with some music magazines even adding the top downloads to their list of charts. Also winner of the "Worst Thing To Happen To My Credit Cards In 2004" award.
Most welcome comeback of the year: Pearl Jam. Yeah, I know they didn't go anywhere, but I stopped listening a few years back. I bought Rearviewmirror, their 2-disc greatest hits set on a total impulse buy a few weeks ago, and listened to the entire thing twice as soon as I got home. I had forgotten how many great songs they have.
Most annoying comeback of the year: "Last Christmas". I've had this damn song in my head for 5 straight weeks now. I don't know whether I heard the original Wham version or Jimmy Eat World's remake first, but it got stuck in there and will not come out.
The Best Albums released in 2004 (in no order):
U2, How To Dismantle An Atomic Bomb
Somebody slips a copy of War to The Edge and reminds him that he’s a great guitarist. Bono combines lyrics about God, his father’s death, and the state of the world into some great songs. There’s too many mid-tempo soundalikes for this to be a truly classic album, but it’s not a stretch to say that this is their best work since Achtung Baby.
Secret Machines, Now Here Is Nowhere
Pink Floyd with John Bonham on drums, by way of Texas. I don’t know why it works, but it does. This was the disc that came the closest to blowing out my speakers this year.
Michael Giacchino, The Incredibles soundtrack
Come on, people! Everything about this movie kicks ass, plain and simple. Think 60’s James Bond scores, and you’re pretty close on this one. Lots of brass and xylophone, and some of the best recurring themes since Star Wars.
The Killers, Hot Fuss
OK, so they dress like Duran Duran. And kind of look like them. And maybe sound like them, just a little bit. The songs are still damn catchy.
Keane, Hopes and Fears
Coldplay - guitars + a slightly more uplifting worldview = gorgeous.
Jem, Finally Woken
Ah, Jem. So beautiful AND so talented. When will you make up that cancelled Indianapolis show so that we can fall in love and run off to Wales together? Until then, I'll just keep listening to your truly excellent album of hip-hop-influenced Brit pop.
Franz Ferdinand, (self-titled)
They’re Scottish. They dress well. We get it. How about the fact that they mixed new wave and disco and made a kick-ass album of fresh-sounding dance-rock?
DJ Danger Mouse, The Grey Album
Danger Mouse lays Jay-Z’s Black Album rhymes over samples from The Beatles’ White Album and pushes music forward 10 years in one step. Too bad it will never get a legal release. Silly short-sighted music industry.
Chris Thile, Deceiver
Nickel Creek’s wünderkind mandolinist goes solo and shows off on a few more instruments... 25 more to be exact. Rock, pop, jazz, bluegrass; Thile does it all (often in the same song) and does it well.
Green Day, American Idiot
Aren’t concept albums what punks were rebelling against in the first place? You’d think this would be a disaster, but instead it’s Green Day’s most mature and powerful disc yet.
The Best Albums I Discovered in 2004
Jay-Z, The Black Album
The Postal Service, Give Up
Spoon, Girls Can Tell
Teitur, Poetry & Aeroplanes
Abandoned Pools, Humanistic
Snow Patrol, Final Straw
Elefant, Sunlight Makes Me Paranoid
Coheed & Cambria, In Keeping Secrets of Silent Earth 3
Sean Watkins, 26 Miles
Paste Magazine's sampler discs (included with each issue)
Song of the Year: "Take Me Out", Franz Ferdinand. Overplayed? Yes. Overhyped? Absolutely. But take a break for a month or two, then go back and listen again. That tempo shift at the 0:56 mark will get your booty shakin' every time.
Runner-up: “American Idiot”, Green Day.
Ubiquitous Singer: Ben Gibbard. Between the O.C., Garden State previews, and an near-perfect guest turn on Styrofoam's "Couches in Alleys", the voice of Death Cab for Cutie and The Postal Service was the world’s most-heard alt-rocker of 2004. Seth Cohen must be so pleased.
Hot Singer: Jem Griffiths. Not only did she put out one of the best albums of the year (see above), her Willow Rosenberg-meets-hip-hop-star looks had me cutting out magazine pictures and hanging them on my wall like I was 12 years old again. The best-looking thing to come out of Wales since, uh... Tom Jones? Ryan Giggs? Ioan Gryffud?
Best technological innovation: iTunes Music store. OK, so it's been around since last year, but it really became a force this year, with some music magazines even adding the top downloads to their list of charts. Also winner of the "Worst Thing To Happen To My Credit Cards In 2004" award.
Most welcome comeback of the year: Pearl Jam. Yeah, I know they didn't go anywhere, but I stopped listening a few years back. I bought Rearviewmirror, their 2-disc greatest hits set on a total impulse buy a few weeks ago, and listened to the entire thing twice as soon as I got home. I had forgotten how many great songs they have.
Most annoying comeback of the year: "Last Christmas". I've had this damn song in my head for 5 straight weeks now. I don't know whether I heard the original Wham version or Jimmy Eat World's remake first, but it got stuck in there and will not come out.
12.15.2004
My apologies
To the 3 or 4 of you out there who actually read this thing on a regular basis, work deadlines and the holidays have combined to severely curtail my blogging time. But have no fear: I'm in the process of compiling some year-end lists which should appear sometime between Christmas and New Year's. Happy Holidays, and thanks for caring enough to read my babble.
12.01.2004
Always Assume the Worst
...and you'll never be disappointed. In discussing Lycos' anti-spam screensaver with my dad, I mentioned that someone would probably hack it before too long. Well, at 3:01 am today, this appeared:
An anonymous reader writes "Lycos, shortly after producing a screen saver to fight spammers using a DoS-style attack appears to have been hacked. Attempting to download the screen saver from lycos results in this message 'Yes, attacking spammers is wrong, you know this, you shouldn't be doing it. Your IP address and request have been logged and will be reported to your ISP for further action.' Or maybe it's just a joke -- can you ever tell?"
An anonymous reader writes "Lycos, shortly after producing a screen saver to fight spammers using a DoS-style attack appears to have been hacked. Attempting to download the screen saver from lycos results in this message 'Yes, attacking spammers is wrong, you know this, you shouldn't be doing it. Your IP address and request have been logged and will be reported to your ISP for further action.' Or maybe it's just a joke -- can you ever tell?"
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